Bowler to recontest for Mayor in 2019

Mayor of the City of Kalgoorlie Boulder has announced this morning he seeks a second term as Mayor. In a release overnight, Mayor Bowler has cited his desire to see a beach in Kalgoorlie Boulder and the Cashless welfare card extended to visitors as a pledge to him seeking a second term.

The following was sent to local media for release at 6 am this morning: 

Kalgoorlie-Boulder Mayor John Bowler has announced he will seek a second term.

Mr Bowler will nominate at next October’s local government elections after serving the past three years as mayor.

He said it had been a tremendous honour to lead the City Council and that being mayor of his hometown was his dream job.

“When I first stood as mayor the only pledge I gave was to keep rates down and with the hard-work and support of staff and council we have been able to achieve that, with what I believe would be the lowest collective increases for more than 20 years,” said Mr Bowler.

“At the same time our financial ranking has increased from 139^th out of 140 councils in WA to the top 20, a remarkable achievement and for that I thank the excellent hard work by our chief executive officer John Walker.”

Mr Bowler said his pledge this time around would centre on community safety and his long-held vision to build a beach.

He said Kalgoorlie-Boulder was the best place to raise a family with the one negative that it was a long way from the ocean so the only solution was to build a beach, hopefully with man-made waves.

“One of our best initiatives was the introduction and funding of the Safer Street Patrol, with the feedback from the community amazing.

“At the same time I proudly led the move to trial the Cashless Welfare Card in the Goldfields and the early indications are that it has achieved every expectation.”

Mr Bowler said the card and patrols had reduced the level of anti-social behaviour in Hannan and Burt Streets but there was still a way to go and the next step he would encourage was for long-term visitors to be put onto the Cashless Card.

He would also approach Canberra about changes to the Fringe Benefit Tax to make it easier for mining companies to develop a residential workforce rather than fly-in fly-out.

In the past three years under his leadership the City Council had been proactive in attracting lithium and other ‘battery’ jobs to Kalgoorlie-Boulder and those projects would continue to boost the already buoyant local economy.

The mayor said in his first term he had to deal with a number of challenging issues but that there had also been many pleasing and fulfilling moments.